The Ethernet (ETH) technology and the MPLS technology are two widely-used packet switching technologies. The ETH technology has been used in an access network before. The MPLS technology is used in a core network, and it is a convergence network of Synchronous Digital Hierarchy/Synchronous Optical Network (SDH/SONET) in the middle. As the SDH/SONET is gradually phased out, the Ethernet and the MPLS network gradually replace the SDH/SONET, so that the Ethernet and the MPLS network begin to be connected together, and the situation that the Ethernet and the MPLS network are interconnected become more common.
The Virtual Private Local Area Network (LAN) Service (VPLS) is a technology widely used at present, which implements traversal of Ethernet in the MPLS network in a manner of ETH over MPLS. Such a manner performs encapsulation using pseudo wire (PW) labels, and Ethernet packets are encapsulated in PWs and then are mapped onto an MPLS Label Switching Path (LSP). The description is provided by taking one service traversing an Ethernet and an MPLS network through points A, B and C as an example, which is specifically as follows.
After receiving a service packet encapsulated by means of Ethernet sent by Node A located at an Ethernet, Node B re-encapsulates the service packet by means of MPLS and then sends the packet to Node C located at an MPLS network, and Node C decapsulates the service packet. In this process, Node A needs to encapsulate a Virtual LAN (VLAN) address, a Media Access Control (MAC) address of Node A and a MAC address of Node C in the service packet, and Node C needs to obtain the VLAN address in addition to the MAC address of Node C and the MAC address of Node A, so as to decapsulate the received service packet. In the VPLS technology, the VLAN information needs to be configured at the MPLS side and remote MAC address information needs to be configured at the Ethernet.
Since it is necessary to configure VLAN information at the MPLS side and to configure remote MAC address information at the Ethernet side, the configuration is relatively complicated.